Again, you’re using the word “algorithm” incorrectly, as you did in the article about NYC. You’re not going to be taken seriously if you continue to display such ignorance of very basic nomenclature. The things you’re talking about are “computer programs” or “software.” Some of them may implement algorithms, but…

This article consistently and repeatedly uses the word “algorithm” incorrectly. The entities they are referring to are “computer programs,” a very different and much less well-defined term. I’d suggest that everyone read the textbook Algorithms by Professor Robert Sedgewick of Princeton University (an old student of…

I’ve seen evidence that all sous vide cylinder cookers have the same internals — heating element, circulator fan — possibly manufactured by a single company. The differences in price seem to result from the finish on the outside of the cylinder and the electronics at the top. Our sous vide cooker, bought over a year…

I’ve seen evidence that all sous vide cylinder cookers have the same internals — heating element, circulator fan —…

“Freedom of Speech” is about your freedom not to have the government restrict your speech. As a side-effect, it allows us to drown out your free speech with OUR free speech. Your problem is that other people have the same rights that you do.

“adobo duck legs with saffron rice pilaf and chive crema”

“traveling hundreds of millions of miles.”

Go isn’t complicated; the rules of the game can be written on about half a page, around 500 words. The rules of chess are about 1200 words; note that chess has six different kinds of pieces, Go has only one.

“cleanses all sense of self from anyone who touches it.”

Have you failed to notice what motivates Trump? It’s all about his ego.

<blockquote><i>0-60 in 2.4 seconds—shaving a millisecond off</i></blockquote>Which means it used to be 2.401 seconds. Shouldn’t people writing for Gizmodo know what a millisecond is?

Thanks so much for the video and link. The whole way through the video I was thinking how great it would be to have a copy of the notebook, and just below was the Amazon link! Perfect!

“He has no advanced degrees.”

A space elevator would do much more than “only get us to geostationary orbit.” Just climb down to the far end, the counterweight, and let go at the right time, and it’ll sling you to Mars, Venus, even Jupiter. The end of the elevator is traveling at about 7.7 km/sec and is most of the way out of Earth’s gravity well.…

One of the real problems with the Space Elevator is the constant barrage of jokes about elevator music, kids pushing all 1,000,000 buttons, flatulence, etc. that people with the minds of 6-year-olds come up with. When we can solve that problem, the actual building of the elevator will be a snap.

In one design, the tiny fraction of the Space Elevator that’s in the atmosphere, and thus exposed to weather, is a round cable less than the diameter of a pencil. There’s very little area for the wind to push against. It’s not a HUGE target when it’s so small you can’t see it from 50 feet away, let alone fly a plane…

The Space Elevator won’t collapse; it might break or be cut. However, given that it is essentially a yard-wide piece of Saran Wrap, the part below the break will just flutter to earth. The part above will just hang there (it’s supported from above, after all) or move outwards a bit.

Once we have the first one in place, it’s easy and cheap to build a second. We’d probably end up with a few dozen or more spaced around the equator, of different capacities and purposes.

I have an old keyboard Kindle displaying the current time, date, and weather information harvested from nearby Weather Underground weather-stations. (Because they are amateur stations, they tend to go down frequently, so the Kindle has to be able to switch from one to another. Fortunately there are a half-dozen of…

Old Kindle Paperwhites can be repurposed as useful wall-mounted displays using the browser and a permanent power supply. I have one displaying time, date, and information from a nearby weather station and another for logging cats in and out the front door. Various flavors of home automation would be an obvious use.

When I was working at ITT in London in 1976, the project in the lab next door was a cell phone system for the MoD. The cell towers were just like we have now, except for being mounted on trucks, but the “handset” was an entire jeep stuffed full of electronics with places for a driver and a general officer to sit. Same…